Abyss of the Shrine Maiden

Bane, the Crimson Demon

One hour later, Gardens of Calamity

After the expanded team of Kirito, Asuna, Jaymes, Koharu, Klein, Leafa, Strea, Sinon, and Philia made it to the next region, the Garden of Calamity, Kirito called for a break now that’s it evening time. A few members went offline for the hour; others like Koharu and Jaymes remained online and an ironic source of comfort in the choking heat. Furthermore, once the break was over, the entire group--including those back in town--would be present, as Jaymes determined Premiere’s okay to come with them under watch.

While Jaymes and Klein engaged in a friendly duel that expanded into a three-person fight once Kirito returned online, Koharu and the influx of girls talked amongst themselves until the time to reconvene came up. Everyone listened as Kirito gave two simple instructions: one, their goal is to catch up to the masked NPC before calling it a night (thankfully, it’s a Saturday); two, a small subset of the twelve players will monitor Premiere directly, them being Silica, Liz, and Philia. They’re arguably the three weakest fighters in relative combat ability, Koharu thinks to herself. It’s the only good reason Kirito didn’t assign someone like Leafa or Klein to play guard duty; they’ll be better used fighting any monster that comes their way.

Her assumption would later have merit as the group traveled the narrow, cavernous, lava-filled Garden of Calamity, taking out Lava Slimes monsters and destroying their crystal remains to bring down barriers in the way. Besides that, the two parties lead by Kirito and Jaymes avoided combat as much as possible, leaving it to the other adventurous players that have flooded the area in the last hour until they came across a mob designated as their target for the site, the Brutal Flare Devil.

“And he’s down!” Klein cheers while wiping sweat off his head as the Brutal Flare Devil falls to his last attack. He holds his thumb up to the girls while Kirito steps to his side and looks towards the now-passable pathway now that its guardian is defeated.

“According to Argo, word on the block is that there are four bosses in the next area.”

“F-Four?”

“That’s insane!”

Klein balls his fists enthusiastically. “Four, huh? Sounds like a challenge, but not all at once, right?”

“I don’t know. But we should be careful nevertheless. To speed things up, we can split up between my party and Jaymes’, got it?”

Jaymes lightly shrugs as he closes his open system menu. “Fine with me. Let’s get to it.”

xxxxxxxxx

The Carven Road, 45 minutes and two bosses later

Ironically, it is Jaymes’ party of himself, Koharu, Lisbeth, Silica, Premiere, and Philia that succeed in their task of eliminating their two bosses first. However, neither fight was easy, even with two former front liners. Koharu mentally curses as she takes a seat once her team makes it to the rendezvous point. Beside her drops Premiere, the rapier-user makes a very human face of discomfort. Philia and Strea park their bodies elsewhere while the remaining three party members stand a distance away and converse quite intently to themselves. Koharu can’t hear anything, but it seems Lisbeth and Silica are unhappy with Jaymes about something, and he’s disappointed they’re unhappy.

For now, she’ll let her partner fight his own battles; in the meantime, she faces Premiere. “How are you doing, Premiere? It doesn’t seem like you're having headaches anymore.”

“I am doing fine, Koharu, for the moment.”

“That’s great… Of course, who can be doing perfectly well when the environment around us is like this? The only consolidation would be the presence of a hot spring somewhere on this floor. But given this is Aincrad, I doubt there is one.”